The Influence of the Selectorate on Gender Representation: The Case of Candidate Selection for European Elections

Despite a gradual improvement, the European Parliament, as most of its national counterparts, still suffers from a social representation deficit in terms of gender with women amounting to less than third of the outgoing MEPs in 2014. Previous studies suggest that the representation of voters is clearly affected by the selection of candidates by political parties. In particular, the role and composition of the selectorate is often underlined as the most crucial and defining criteria. One hypothesis is that exclusive selecting agencies would benefit women. This paper examines the evidence for this hypothesis, which might seem counter-intuitive since more inclusive selectorates composed of members or even voters are themselves more socially representatives. Yet, one posited explanation is that party leadership usually includes higher-educated and more liberal individuals in their attitude toward gender equality and minority rights (Randall, 1987). Another set of arguments sees smaller groups as being better able to balance a list composition, while in contrast the power of incumbents (disproportionately men) would be increased in the case of enlarged selectorates (Rahat and Sher-Hadar, 1999; Hazan and Rahat, 2000). This paper thus analyses how far the pattern of EP legislative recruitment can be explained by the parties’ demand for candidates, their gatekeepers being constrained by formal rules and informal practices, including gendered ones. More specifically, it asks whether ‘who’ selects has an impact on the representation of women in the EU legislature. The research is based on a unique dataset of the candidate selection methods used in the national political parties of the 27 member states for the 2009 European elections (updated for 2014 if time allows), containing the selection processes’ formal rules and informal procedures regarding the selectorate (including mixed and multi-stage systems), as well as detailed accounts of the list formation criteria concerning gender.